"Oh, my God. Is this Marcy Playground?" Spencer turns the radio up, riding shotgun in Aiden's car.

"Probably." Aiden spits a sunflower seed out of the window. "Change it."

"I love Marcy Playground!"

"No one loves Marcy Playground."

I laugh out loud from the backseat. "This is so not what I think it is."

Spencer begins to sing along. "It's growing, it's all knowing, it is glowing bright..."

"Bright red!" I join in, not able to help myself.

Aiden mutters something, but we can't really hear him over the music. "And so I'm in love, yeah, love bug his kind will forever shine, so open up your heart and - "

Aiden abruptly switches the station. "I'm sorry. I couldn't take it. I'm only one man."

"That was the best part." Spencer groans, looking at him, obviously displeased. "You have the worst taste in music I've like, ever seen."

"This is Led Zeppelin, got it? This is a classic."

"Spencer loves Marcy Playground. You really just can't talk her out of it."

Spencer nods at him, so he knows I speak the truth.

"Ashley, you know what I'm saying, right? Your Dad, now that's a guy who knows music." Aiden taps on his steering wheel to the Zeppelin tune. "One of the greatest rock bands of all time."

"Purple Venom." I agree, with a slight shrug of my shoulders. "They were okay."

"Just okay?" Aiden peers at me in the rearview mirror. "You don't like your own Dad's band?"

"He wasn't really my Dad." I tell him shortly. "He died when I was like, three."

"Ashley's rock royalty." Spencer tries to lighten up the conversation a bit with her sweet interjection.

"Didn't he leave you some huge inheritance?" Aiden asks bluntly.

I blink at him. "Yeah, he actually did. I officially gain control of the Davies fortune when I'm 18." Not that I care in any particular way. It's just how things will be.

"Sweet!" Aiden swivels his head to look at me. "That's gotta feel good, right?"

"I don't know. I don't really care." I tell him, truthfully.

"You're going to be totally rich. Like, loaded." Aiden goes on, then I see Spencer squeeze his leg to tell him to shutup about it.

She reaches her other hand around to the back of the seat, opening it and closing it. That's my signal, and I place it in hers. She catches my eye in the rearview mirror and grins at me playfully. "Ashley's going to buy a mansion in LA and I'm going to be her live in maid."

Something we joked about as kids. "I wouldn't have it any other way." I give her hand two quick squeezes and release it.

I would have. I would have bought Spencer a whole damn mansion if that meant I could get her to myself, where she'd finally feel safe enough to be with me.

"Nice. Party as Spencer and Ashley's in a year and a half." Aiden laughs.

We never got that far.

"I changed my mind."

Hailey tosses the bottle cap onto the table, sliding the beer over to me. "Talk. Talk to me, Ashley. and stop looking so damn sad."

"I don't look sad." I hate to report that I have the hiccups.

"Who's Spencer? Why did you freak out when you saw Aiden?" Hailey asks, looking genuinely concerned.

"Why do you care so much? Christ, just let me take a nap." I squeeze my eyes shut, throwing my arm over my face.

I hear Hailey get up and leave the room for a few seconds, then I feel her crouch down next to me.

I open my eyes to a picture of Spencer staring back at me. I instantly look away. "Put that back."

"What did she...damn, girl, what did she do to you?" Hailey stands up, taking a long drag off of her cigarette.

I swing my legs onto the floor, urging myself to sit up straight. I look at Hailey, and she's blurry around the edges. I take a gulp of my beer. "Nothin'." My voice betrays me, and Hailey knows its not 'nothin''.

"Talk." The cigarette dangles from her lip and she holds Spencer's picture in both hands. "Or I rip."

"Rip it. I don't care." I rasp, taking another drink because my mouth has suddenly become dry.

I hear a tiny shredding sound, and I should have known Hailey wasn't bluffing. "Stop it! Don't - don't rip it."

"Who is Spencer, Ashley?" The picture continues to drip. She's drunk enough to tear it into pieces.

"I was in love with her!" I cry, probably a little too loud, but she stops ripping. She looks taken aback and tosses the picture back at me, sitting crosslegged in front of me.

I pick up the photo and smooth out the edges. "Talk." She orders, and this time I sigh, steadying myself.

"She was my best friend."

"Yeah?"

"Since I was six. She lived in my Mom's apartment complex, we were...together everyday."

"Friends forever. I get it."

"Basically, yeah. We were the greatest friends, we..." I shrug, not sure how to explain our bond to someone who'd never seen us together. Without sounding pathetic. "We were that person for each other, you know?"

She just nods.

"Anyways." I set my beer on the table, not looking at her. "It soon became...apparent after we got a little older that we wanted more from each other. Both of us. You could tell, it was so obvious."

"You two dated?"

I shake my head, feeling distant. "No." I say wistfully. "Never. I came out just before my freshman year, but Spencer...well, she never got that far. It scared her so bad, I think. Her Mom was one of those types that would do that to you." I try to laugh and fail miserably, so I just grab my beer instead.

"So...what happened?"

"Well, she made it clear that she wanted me, too. She just never wanted to talk about it. We would sleep in each other's bed, hold hands, and make each other blush, but...we never talked about it. It was right in front of us, and we never spoke of it." Just saying this makes me realize how ridiculous it was to spend 12 years of my life like that. "It was...painful. It hurt."

Hailey doesn't say anything. She looks genuinely sad for me.

"She got a boyfriend." I can't stop now. "I was in love with her for like, my whole life and she tells me she feels the same and then suddenly, Aiden's in the picture." My lip curls. "I had to watch them kiss, be a couple, smile at each other. And it broke my heart. Damn, it broke my heart."

The alcohol is making me honest, too honest, and my emotion is purely evident in my voice. "I'm sorry, Ashley."

I wish I could shutup but I can't stop now.

"No. No. Don't apologize, I mean...I don't know if I ever expected anything. I just never thought...You know, I never dated anyone. Not a single person. Because I knew she would...she wouldn't want to see that. She always told me I was stronger, but I wasn't. I was just better with pain."

"Shit, Ashley."

A harsh laugh escapes my throat, and I put my face in my hands. It's tough to remember all this. "I never wanted her to have to choose. Never. I wanted her to know I would be there for her, so I was there, I endured it. I didn't want her to think she was hurting me, because that would hurt her. I wouldn't ever want that. I stood there and took it."

I know Hailey's never seen me like this. She might be a little freaked out, and when I peek at her through my fingers, she just appears sad. Sad for me, and I can't blame her, I sound completely beaten right now.

"So, one day you got tired, and left?" Hailey prods gently.

I can hardly find my voice this time. "No." I say softly. "No. No. I never would have budged."

"Then, what happened?"

I stare at the wall, a memory bubbling up inside of me, not bothering to answer her. "A long time ago. Almost 15 years ago, in the lot behind our apartment. A giant field with those, towers? Electrical towers? It was probably dangerous, I don't know why our parents let us play there, but...there was wet cement. We wrote out names in it, with the date, I think."

Hailey is completely silent, and I'm drudging this out of nowhere. I didn't even know I remembered.

"She kissed me. We were just standing there, talking. I don't know about what, I can hardly...remember. It was so long ago. But she leaned over and kissed me." I rub my eyes furiously, feeling them water. "She was my first kiss, I was just 8 and it was completely innocent but...I don't know. It's stupid and I can hardly remember it, but it just shows me she knew. She had to know, even at the beginning, right?"

"Even at the beginning..." Hailey echoes, not sure what else to say.

I slap my thighs, and take a quick drink of my beer, gathering myself together. "So, that's how it went. That's how she completely cracked me open and then...I left. Then I met you, and..here I am."

"Here you are." Hailey's still repeating me.

I sigh, reaching out to grab Spencer's picture, gazing at her right in the photographed eyes. "She just couldn't handle it." I remember tiny, rambunctious Spencer, at 7 years old, daring to kiss me in the field behind our houses and then climbing over the fence to open the gate for me. I miss her dearly, so much so in this moment that it physically hurts me. I wish I couldn't recall her face, any of her words.

I don't like it, and before I can stop my fingers, they're tearing the picture apart into tiny, confetti-like pieces. "Spencer Carlin." I mutter, tossing the pieces into the air. "Wish I'd never met her."

Hailey just laughs at my dramatic gesture, my obvious lie. "That Aiden guy, he gave me his phone number. He said...well, I don't think he was all that in to me, because he told me to have you call him."

She presses a small piece of paper in to my hand, and to my surprise, I accept it.